Top Spin 4 vs. Virtua Tennis 4

With the thick of tennis season approaching this summer, Sega and 2K Sports’ latest installments of their respective series —Virtua Tennis 4 and Top Spin 4 — take center court. Like all sports games, which title you’ll ultimately gravitate toward will depend on how much realism you want to have in your gaming experience.

If you’re looking for nuance and finesse, Top Spin4 is the way to go. Virtua Tennis 4’s roots are firmly in its quarter-crunching past. Three buttons control the kind of shots you make — slices, top spin and lob shots. How powerful these shots are depends on your position. Trying to hit a ball off-balance results in a weak return. You can control where your return will land by holding the left analog stick in the desired direction.

The controls are easy enough to pick up and plenty forgiving, but those craving a little more control to pull off riskier shots will be left wanting, especially when it feels like the computer-controlled opponent seems able to return everything you throw at it.

A MORE COMPLEX WAY TO PLAY: On the other hand, Top Spin 4’s gameplay can be daunting in the beginning. Thankfully, the in-depth tutorial breaks down the control scheme and shows the numerous strokes at the player’s disposal into bite-sized pieces.

It’s a lot to digest, but choosing between a flat or topspin shot, a slice or lob, power and precision strokes, and when to hit inside-out becomes second nature with enough repetition. When it finally all comes together, there’s a real sense of accomplishment when you send a crosscourt shot whizzing past an opponent or execute a perfect drop shot.

TENNIS STARS AND LEGENDS: I wouldn’t consider myself a hard-core tennis fan; my interest probably peaks around the time of each major tournament. Thus, a number of the players in both games had a lot of unfamiliar names and faces. There are, of course, big names such as Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Andy Roddick and Novak Djokovic on the men’s side.

Virtua Tennis 4 has a stronger female roster including reigning No. 1 Caroline Wozniacki, Maria Sharapova and Ana Ivanovic. Oddly, each game splits the Williams sisters — Serena Williams is in Top Spin 4, while older sister Venus is in Virtua Tennis 4.

Top Spin 4 also includes tennis legends including Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi and Bjorn Borg. Jim Courier is a playable character in Virtua Tennis 4; Boris Becker, Stefan Edberg and Patrick Rafter are only available in the PlayStation 3 version.

Neither game, unfortunately, features much in the way of female tennis legends. Would it have hurt to throw in a couple of them? Martina Navratilova? Steffi Graf? Martina Hingis? Monica Seles?

Both games really double-faulted on this one. At least you can set up some interesting inter-gender singles and doubles matchups.

Both games feature deep and involved single-player campaigns in which you control the destiny of a created player, taking him or her from the bottom to the upper echelons of the tennis world.

MOVEMENT TICKETS:Virtua Tennis 4’s campaign plays like a board game. You get movement tickets to advance along the path and then go into whatever activity is slotted for the spot you land. These activities can be training drills to boost your skills, playing in tournaments or exhibition matches, or various off-court activities that help boost your fame rating.

Some of the bigger tournaments require a particular fame rating to participate. Successfully completing training drills and winning tournaments earns money to purchase custom gear for your player or unlock extra playing styles. It’s an intriguing concept, but somewhat falls flat in its execution.

Navigating the map requires a lot of jumping between menus. If you get a bad slate of movement points — unless you have a shuffle ticket that grants you a mulligan — there’s little to do but grin and bear it. And even as you move deep into the heart of the schedule, there’s no feeling that your avatar is showing improvement.

The training drills, in the form of minigames (more on them later), do help keep things from bogging down.

RPG TRAITS: If I had to describe the single-player campaign for Top Spin 4 in one word, it would be “immersive.” The premise is the same –- take a created player to the top of the tennis rankings. Instead of a board game, the campaign is broken down by a month-to-month format. There’s an initial training session and then competing in your choice of up to four tournaments.

Some tournaments aren’t readily available and are unlocked when various conditions are met, such as acquiring a sponsor or achieving a certain ranking. Taking part in drills and competition awards experience points that can be used to level up certain playing styles and their associated statistics.

My created character, an Aussie named Chuck Finley, has developed a formidable serve and baseline attack so far. You can create up to four different characters.

MULTIPLAYER MODES: There’s a real sense of accomplishment building up your avatar’s skills and moving into more prestigious — and thus more challenging — tournaments with stronger opponents. What’s even better is you can also gain experience for your created player by using him or her in the other single-player modes or entering the online World Tour, which plays like the single-player campaign but with live human opponents subbing in for AI-controlled superstars. A leaderboard tracks your win-loss record and current ranking.

Both Virtua Tennis 4 and Top Spin 4 support local multiplayer in addition to online play. Up to four people can get together to play a spirited doubles match, either locally or online.

Virtua Tennis 4 also supports the Kinect, but the action is limited to multiplayer and that only allows two players to play locally in a regular tennis match. Still, I have to give the multiplayer edge to Virtua Tennis 4 for its variety of diversions.

Whereas Top Spin 4 is pretty much all tennis all the time, Virtua Tennis 4 also includes several tennis-based minigames.

They include trying to play a point in increasingly windy conditions, using a tennis serve to score soccer goals, or leading chicks to safety while avoiding tennis balls lobbed from machines. It fits nicely with the arcadelike tone of the game and provides a welcome break. I found the chick-saving game in particular to be a huge time sink.

THE VERDICT: In the end, I liked Virtua Tennis 4, but the truth is I loved Top Spin 4. That’s not to say Virtua Tennis 4 is a bad game. The simplistic controls and shallow campaign mode really left me craving more depth to sink my teeth into.

And that’s what Top Spin 4 provided. It had an engrossing World Tour mode in combination with complex, yet precise, controls that created a rewarding single-player experience that can be savored like a fine meal.

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